Thousands of years ago, using only their observation of the stars, the Mayans managed to calculate the length of the lunar moon as 329.53020 days, only 34 seconds out. The Mayan long count calendar ends it's latest 5126 year cycle on December 21, 2012. Given that they were pretty close to the mark with the lunar cycle, it's likely that they have a pretty good idea about what the stars mean.
Add to this the fact that Solar experts from around the world monitoring the sun have made a startling discovery. Our sun is behaving badly. The energy output of the sun is, like most things in nature, cyclic, and it's supposed to be in the middle of a period of relative stability. However, recent solar storms have been bombarding the Earth with so much radiation energy, it's been knocking out power grids and destroying satellites. This activity is predicted to get worse, and calculations suggest it'll reach its deadly peak sometime in 2012.
Scientists in Europe have been building the world's largest particle accelerator. Basically its a 27km tunnel designed to smash atoms together to find out what makes the Universe tick. However, the mega-gadget has caused serious concern, with some scientists suggesting that it's properly even a bad idea to turn it on in the first place. They're predicting all manner of deadly results, including mini black holes. So when this machine is fired up for its first serious experiment in 2012, the world could be crushed into a super-dense blob the size of a basketball.
If having scientists warning us about the end of the world isn't bad enough, religious folks are getting in on the act as well. Interpretations of the Christian Bible reveal that the date for Armageddon, the final battle between Good an Evil, has been set down for 2012. The I Ching, also known as the Chinese book of Changes, says the same thing, as do various sections of the Hindu teachings.
Yellowstone National Park in the United States is famous for its thermal springs and Old Faithful geyser. The reason for this is simple - it's sitting on top of the world's biggest volcano, and geological experts are beginning to get nervous sweats. The Yellowstone volcano has a pattern of erupting every 650,000 years or so, and we're many years overdue for an explosion that will fill the atmosphere with ash, blocking the sun and plunging the Earth into a frozen winter that could last up to 15,000 years. The pressure under the Yellowstone is building steadily, and geologists have set 2012 as a likely date for the big bang.
As I was contemplating that I may have only one more year to live and here I am wasting time blogging, I noticed my little granddaughter staring intently at the presents piling up under the Christmas tree. I saw the serious look on her face and I asked, What's the matter dear? She looked at me and asked, “How come it is taking you all so long to get all the presents when Santa can do it all in one night?
I looked into those big beautiful eyes that were seriously expecting an answer, (Grandad knows all), and for a second still reeling from the realisation of our mortality, I considered telling her the following story....
There are approximately two billion children (persons under 18) in the world. However, since Santa does not visit children of Muslim, Hindu, Jewish or Buddhist (except maybe in Japan) religions, this reduces the workload for Christmas night to 15% of the total, or 378 million (according to the population reference bureau). At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that comes to 108 million homes, presuming there is at least one good child in each. Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 967.7 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with a good child, Santa has around 1/1000 th of a second to park the sleigh, hop out, jump down the chimney, fill the stocking, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat cookies, drink the milk, get back up the chimney, jump into the sleigh and get onto the next house.
Assuming that each of these 108 million stops is evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false, but will accept for the purposes of our calculations), we are now talking about 0.78 miles per household; a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not counting bathroom stops or breaks. This means Santa’s sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second — 3,000 times the speed of sound.For purposes of comparison, the fastest man made vehicle, the Ulysses space probe, moves at only 27.4 miles per second, and a conventional reindeer can run at 15 miles per hour.
The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized LEGO set (two pounds), the sleigh is carrying over 500 thousand tons, not counting Santa himself. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that the "flying" reindeer can pull 10 times the normal amount, the job can’t be done with eight or even nine of them—Santa would need 360,000 of them. This increases the payload, not counting the weight of the sleigh, another 54,000 tons, or roughly seven times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth II (the ship, not the monarch). 600,000 tons travelling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance – this would heat up the reindeer in the same fashion as a spacecraft re-entering the earth’s atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer would adsorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per second each. In short, they would burst into flames almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them and creating deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team would be vaporised within 4.26 thousandths of a second, or right about the time Santa reached the fifth house on his trip. Not that it matters, however, since Santa, as a result of accelerating from a dead stop to 650 m.p.s. in .001 seconds, would be subjected to acceleration forces of 17,000 g’s. A 250 pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim after all those milk and cookies) would be pinned to the back of the sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and reducing him to a quivering blob of pink goo.
Therefore, if Santa did exist, he’s dead now. Merry Christmas.
However, I looked at this innocent child who believes every word that comes out of my mouth and said, “Santa has magic, honey.” She walked away, back to her Wii without a care in the world.
How could I write about doom and gloom after that. The lesson here is simple. This world is full of uncertainty but one thing is certain. If we are to have a future it lies with our children and grandchildren. We need to realise that whatsoever the creator of the universe, (whatever you perceive him, her or it, to be), has in store for us, there is really nothing we can do about it. Our task is to make this world a better place for those who follow behind us. Every child has a right to a childhood and if, by helping a child believe that there are powers greater than themselves that exist in the world I am being a hypocrite, I stand condemned.
The world might indeed undergo some dramatic change next year so in the meantime enjoy this festive season and make it special for the ones you love. You never know, it might just be your last.
Quote of the Day
"If you knew that hope and despair were paths to the same destination, which would you choose?" ~Robert Brault
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